Mayor Mike Duggan (left) and City Councilman Gabe Leland announced a property assessment reduction for most of Detroit homeowners Monday.

The city slashed property assessments for most Detroit home owners Monday, a move expected to cut the cost of owning a home in one of the most heavily taxed cities in the state.

Cuts for about 95 percent of residential property owners start next summer and range from 5 percent to 15 percent and reduce the assessed value of Detroit properties by almost $213 million, Mayor Mike Duggan announced Monday. Assessments, however, will rise 5 percent, for about 5,400 parcels mostly in the downtown and Midtown areas.

The city has cut assessments three years in a row, but the reduction announced Monday covers a broader portion of Detroit. The reduction comes as city officials conduct the first citywide property reassessment in almost 50 years and try to stem an exodus that has seen the city's population shrink about 62 percent from a high of 1.8 million people in 1950.

“While good news for the city, if you’re thinking about buying a house, I’d say this is the year to do it because we will be very unlikely to see assessment reductions like this next year,” Duggan said.

The steepest cuts — 15 percent — will happen in neighborhoods north of downtown, Duggan said, followed by 5 percent cuts to the southwest and east sides of Detroit.

The rise in commercial and industrial assessments offsets the reduction in assessments for residential properties, city Finance Director John Naglick said.

The previous two rounds of cuts have not hurt city finances, Duggan said.

Property tax collections have risen from 67 percent two years ago to 72 percent last year.

"This year, we are collecting at 78 percent," Duggan said.

At $97.1 million, property tax revenue is running $10 million ahead of budget, he added.

"More people are staying in their homes, avoiding foreclosure and are paying taxes," Duggan said.

The cuts announced Monday should help more residents, said Detroit resident Jackie Grant, 68.

Grant lives in the MorningSide neighborhood on the city's east side in an 1,800-square-foot Tudor-style home and fought her property tax assessment about six years ago. She volunteers helping residents facing foreclosure and said the cuts announced Monday could help stabilize neighborhoods.

"The potential effect is more people can stay in the city and not be foreclosed," Grant said.

The assessment reduction comes amid an ongoing review by Chief Assessor Gary Evanko and his team of current assessments and home sales dating back to October 2013.

"Each individual property will have new valuation ... and that will serve as a basis for Detroit land records going into the future," he said.

Detroit has one of the highest tax rates nationwide — 69 mills, or $69 for every $1,000 of assessed value -- and is plagued with problems, including unfairly distributed tax burdens, inflated assessments, high rates of tax delinquency, and thousands of foreclosures, according to a 2015 report by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. The institute recommended that Detroit cut its property-tax rate.

"Detroit has the highest tax rate of any major U.S. city, more than double the average rate for neighboring cities," the report concluded. "Lowering the rate could reduce delinquency and help increase property values, and could help offset increased tax burdens that may otherwise result from reducing abatements or eliminating the taxable-value cap."

The reduction also comes less than three years after Gov. Rick Snyder cited the city's high tax rate while authorizing Detroit to file the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history. Detroit emerged from bankruptcy protection 14 months ago after shedding about $7 billion in debt.